Three-dimensional dissipative optical solitons

A brief overview of recent theoretical results in the area of three-dimensional dissipative optical solitons is given. A systematic analysis demonstrates the existence and stability of both fundamental (spinless) and spinning three-dimensional dissipative solitons in both normal and anomalous group-velocity regimes. Direct numerical simulations of the evolution of stationary solitons of the three-dimensional cubic-quintic Ginzburg-Landau equation show full agreement with the predictions based on computation of the instability eigenvalues from the linearized equations for small perturbations. It is shown that the diffusivity in the transverse plane is necessary for the stability of vortex solitons against azimuthal perturbations, while fundamental (zero-vorticity) solitons may be stable in the absence of diffusivity. It has also been found that, at values of the nonlinear gain above the upper border of the soliton existence domain, the three-dimensional dissipative solitons either develop intrinsic pulsations or start to expand in the temporal (longitudinal) direction keeping their structure in the transverse spatial plane. Presented at 9-th International Workshop on Nonlinear Optics Applications, NOA 2007, May 17–20, 2007, Świnoujście, Poland     

Quantum fluctuations of spatial dissipative solitons in a nonlinear interferometer

A quantum Langevin equation is derived that makes it possible to study the radiation field in a large-aperture nonlinear interferometer excited by external classical radiation. This equation is linearized in the vicinity of the solution for a stationary soliton. A mathematical formalism for obtaining a spectral representation of the solution to the linearized problem is constructed. It is shown that, in general, the excitation spectrum of a soliton consists of three branches, two of which belong to a continuous spectrum, while the third branch is discrete. The spectral representation obtained makes it possible to rigorously define the operator of soliton coordinate fluctuations, since, as is shown in the study, the traditional definition of this operator leads to a divergence in the vicinity of the solution. A new type of dissipative soliton is found, which is a natural generalization of a stationary soliton and takes into account its motion. A relation is found between this soliton and the contribution to the solution for field fluctuations from the discrete spectrum expansion. The mean squares of fluctuations of the soliton coordinate and momentum are calculated. A range of parameters is determined where the momentum of the soliton can always be measured with a spread smaller than the standard quantum limit. This possibility is related to the occurrence of states squeezed with respect to the soliton momentum. A scheme is proposed for the experimental observation of these states.     

Rotating discrete dissipative optical solitons

Regimes of motionless and moving switching waves and discrete solitons are found for a two-dimensional set of weakly coupled single-mode optical fibers. A regime of a stable sharply localized soliton structure whose center of gravity moves along a curvilinear closed trajectory in the cross section is found. Scenarios of the regime destabilization upon variation of system parameters are considered.     

Heat dissipative solitons in optical fibers

We propose a one-dimensional model governing the propagation of heat waves in an optical fiber (the “fiber fuse”). The model has solutions in the form of high temperature localized waves moving towards the input end of the fiber, fueled by the laser power. These waves can be ignited by local heating at any point along the fiber. The effect of such a wave is irreversible damage to the fiber core. The phenomenon was observed earlier by Hand and Russell, when locally heating a fiber through which CW light of modest intensity was propagating. This induced self-destruction of the optical fiber core.     

Convection-induced stabilization of optical dissipative solitons

In spatially extended convective systems, the reflection symmetry breaking induced by drift effects leads to a striking nonlinear effect that drastically affects the formation and stability of dissipative solitons in optical parametric oscillators. The phenomenon of nonlinear-induced convection dynamics is revealed using a model of the complex quintic Ginzburg-Landau equation with nonlinear gradient terms in it. Mechanisms leading to stabilization of dissipative solitons by convection are singled out. The predictions are in very good agreement with numerical solutions found from the governing equations of the optical parametric oscillators.     

Velocity of heat dissipative solitons in optical fibers

In the fiber fuse, a pulse of high temperature travels toward the input end of the fiber, where high-power laser light is launched into the fiber. At any point along the fiber, the soliton can be ignited. The fiber core is damaged in the process so that light cannot propagate beyond the hot spot. This phenomenon is an example of a dissipative soliton that can exist only in the presence of an external energy supply and internal loss. We analyze this phenomenon, derive an expression for the velocity of the soliton, and determine its width as functions of the physical parameters of the laser and the fiber material.     

Regular and stochastic motion of dissipative optical solitons

Investigations of the motion of dissipative optical solitons and their complexes in wide-aperture nonlinearly optical (with coherent pump radiation) and laser (with incoherent pump radiation) systems have been reviewed. An important characteristic of dissipative solitons is the topology of the energy fluxes, which determines the internal structure of individual solitons and makes it possible to certainly separate the cases of the weak and strong interactions between the solitons. It has been shown that the character of the regular motion of dissipative soliton structures in a homogeneous system is determined by the symmetry of the transverse distributions of the intensity and energy flux; the motion of asymmetric structures is curvilinear. This is also valid for complexes of three-dimensional dissipative optical solitons, “laser bullets.” The extreme possibilities of localization of solitons are determined by quantum noises. The corresponding Brownian motion of the center of the dissipative optical soliton is characterized by a much lower level of the statistic dispersion of the coordinates of its center and velocity than that in the case of conservative solitons.     

Dissipative optical solitons in the absence of bistability and modulation instability

Transversely one-dimensional localized field structures in a wide-aperture interferometer with inertialess nonlinearity of a threshold form are analyzed theoretically for the case when modulation instability of the transversely homogeneous field distributions is absent. It is shown that dissipative solitons exist even in the case of monostability (in the absence of bistability of the homogeneous distributions). In this case, the number of types of solitons turns out to be finite. The possibility of existence of pulsating solitons in an interferometer with inertialess nonlinearity is indicated.     

Phenomenological equations of motion of dissipative optical solitons

Phenomenological equations of motion and rotation of “rigid” (with an invariable structure) asymmetric complexes of autosolitons in a homogeneous surroundings are proposed. These equations are shown to describe the curvilinear (circular) motion and the simultaneous rotation of the complexes that was earlier found numerically for asymmetric complexes of two-dimensional laser autosolitons.     

On three-dimensional dissipative optical solitons: Collisions of laser bullets and topological solitons

Results of numerical simulation of collisions of two fundamental laser bullets—three-dimensional solitons formed in a medium with saturable amplification and absorption and frequency dispersion—are presented. A new collision regime resulting in the formation and the propagation of a switching wave is revealed. The existence of a metastable topological (with a wave front dislocation and an annular intensity distribution) three-dimensional dissipative optical soliton is demonstrated.     

Observation of a discrete family of dissipative solitons in a nonlinear optical system

We report on the observation of a discrete family of spatial dissipative solitons in a simple optical pattern forming system, which is based on a modified single-mirror feedback arrangement. After a pitchfork bifurcation the system possesses two (nearly) equivalent coexisting states of different polarizations. The spatial solitons correspond to excursions from one of the two states serving as a background state towards the other one. The members of the soliton family differ in the number of high-amplitude radial oscillations. The observations are in good agreement with numerical simulations and general expectations for dissipative solitons.     

Effect of Stoke's displacement of absorption and emission bands on optical bistability in a Fabry-Perot interferometer

Journal of Applied Spectroscopy -     

Temperature effect on dissipative holographicscreening-photovoltaic solitons in a biased dissipative system

In a biased dissipative photovoltaic-photorefractive system, this paper investigates the temperature effect on the evolution and the self-deflection of the dissipative holographic screening-photovoltaic （DHSP） solitons. The results reveal that, the evolution and the self-deflection of the bright and dark DHSP solitons are influenced by the system temperature. At a given temperature, for a stable DHSP soliton originally formed in the dissipative system, it attempts to evolve into another DHSP soliton when the temperature change is appropriately small, whereas it will become unstable or break down if the temperature departure is large enough. Moreover, the self-deflection degree of the solitary beam centre increases as temperature rises in some range, while it is decided by the system parameters and is slight under small-signal condition. The system temperature can be adjusted to change the formation and the self-deflection of the solitary beam in order to gain certain optical ends. In a word, the system temperature plays a role for the DHSP solitons in the dissipative system.     

Midband dissipative spatial solitons

We show dissipative spatial solitons in nonlinear optical microresonators in which the refractive index is laterally modulated. In addition to "normal" and "staggered" dissipative solitons, similar to those in spatially modulated conservative systems, a narrow "midband" soliton is shown, having no counterparts in conservative systems.     

Tunable asymmetrical Fano resonance and bistability in a microcavity-resonator-coupled Mach-Zehnder interferometer

We propose a simple microresonator scheme for a Mach-Zehnder interferometer in which a microresonator is side coupled to one arm and a phase shifter is introduced into the other arm, to produce an asymmetric Fano-resonance line shape. In this system, a phase shifter is used to control the variation of the asymmetric line shape, with another reverse resonance next to a resonance minimum over a very narrow frequency range, which results from the interference between a direct channel and a high-Q resonance indirect channel. We also theoretically investigate the novel bistability characteristic based on these shapes.     

Directionally asymmetrical bistability in a symmetrically pumped nonlinear ring interferometer

We consider a nonlinear ring resonator pumped symmetrically by two beams of equal intensities and opposite directions. We show that this system is characterized by a new directionally asymmetrical regime of multistability. This is due to the non-reciprocity of propagation of the counterpropagating waves in the resonator produced by a nonlinear index grating.     

Holographic solitons in photorefractive dissipative systems

A new kind of holographic soliton is proposed for a photorefractive dissipative system consisting of a biased photorefractive crystal and a strong pump beam with a uniform spatial distribution in both transverse dimensions. The self-trapping beam in the system can evolve into a spatial soliton when it couples coherently with the pump beam by two-wave mixing. Unlike the holographic solitons recently proposed by Cohen et al. [Opt. Lett. 27, 2031 (2002)], the most unique features of the present solitons are that they have a fixed amplitude and width that are determined completely by the system parameters and that their existence conditions are independent of the polarity of the bias field. Numerical simulations show that these solitons are stable relative to small perturbations.     

Controllable optical bistability and multistability in a rare-earth-ion-doped optical fiber

We investigated the optical bistability and multistability in an Er³⁺-doped ZrF₄–BaF₂–LaF₃–AlF₃–NaF optical fiber inside an optical ring cavity. It is found that the optical bistability and multistability can be easily controlled via adjusting properly the parameters of the corresponding system. Our scheme may provide some new possibilities for technological applications in optoelectronics and optical-fiber communication.     

Controlling the motion of solitons in BEC by a weakly periodic potential

By developing multiple-scale method combined with Wentzel--Kramer--Brillouin expansion, this paper analytically studies the modulating effect of weakly periodic potential on the dynamical properties of the Bose--Einstein condensates (BEC) trapped in harmonic magnetic traps. A black--grey soliton transition is observed in the BEC trapped in harmonic magnetic potential, due to the weakly periodic potential modulating effect. Meanwhile, it finds that with the slight increase of the weakly periodic potential strength, the velocity of the soliton decreases, while its width firstly decreases then increases, a minimum exists there. These results show that the amplitude, velocity, and width of matter solitons can be effectively managed by means of a weakly periodic potential.